The Impacts of Fracking

What It Means For Colorado

Fracking operations often take place in close proximity to homes, schools, public spaces, and drinking water sources, with wide-ranging impacts on health, the economy, and quality of life. These include:

Noise, light, and emissions from diesel generators and on-site equipment.
Heavy truck traffic — each well requires thousands of trips hauling water, sand, and chemicals.
Homes built on top of old or abandoned well sites, often without residents’ knowledge.
Reduced property values near oil and gas operations.

Our Health

The Physicians for Social Responsibility maintain a Compendium of Scientific, Medical, and Media Findings Demonstrating Risks and Harms of Fracking and Associated Gas and Oil Infrastructure which documents over 2,000 peer-reviewed studies that have pointed to negative health outcomes and issues related to living in close proximity to oil and gas operations.

Asthma & Shortness of Breath: People with asthma who live near bigger or larger numbers of active unconventional natural gas wells operated by the fracking industry in Pennsylvania are 1.5 to four times likelier to have asthma attacks than those who live farther away, new Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health research suggests.
Low Birth Weight In Babies: Fracking can lead to low birth weight in babies, premature births, and increased risk of childhood leukemia.
Headaches & Nausea: Exposure to chemicals used in fracking can cause headaches, nausea, dizziness, skin rashes, and burning eyes.
Increased Cancer Risk: Fracking operations can lead to an increased risk of childhood leukemia and risks intensify with increased density of wells as far away as 8 miles.
Congenital Heart Defects: Fracking can lead to congenital heart defects and acute heart failure
Mental Health: According to a 2020 study of unconventional oil and gas production in Colorado, such as hydraulic fracturing and horizontal drilling, development activity near local communities and homes can trigger chronic stress. Ninety percent of respondents reported experiencing chronic stress, with a key cause being their inability to influence where industrial development projects are placed, and how close they can be situated to community members’ homes or their children’s school.

The Environment

Since 1997, most of Colorado’s front range have been out of compliance with EPA air pollution standards. For almost as long, the American Lung Association has assigned many of Colorado’s front-range counties failing “F” grades for high ozone levels. Air pollution can harm both children and adults causing asthma, COPD, lung cancer, heat attacks, stroke, preterm births, premature death.

Air

Since 1997, most of Colorado’s Front Range has been out of compliance with EPA air pollution standards. For nearly as long, the American Lung Association has assigned many Front Range counties failing grades for high ozone levels. Air pollution can harm both children and adults, causing asthma, COPD, lung cancer, heart attacks, stroke, preterm births, and premature death.

Water

Each modern well requires 17 million gallons of water (on average), with some well pads consuming close to a billion gallons.
Fracking water is contaminated with toxic chemicals and can never be returned to the hydrological cycle. This “produced water,” or fracking wastewater, is disposed of in large open pits or injected into deep underground storage wells. Due to limited transparency and regulatory oversight, fracking waste may also end up in landfills or be used as a road de-icer or dust suppressant.
Water used for fracking often comes from freshwater sources, including drinking water reservoirs, lakes, rivers, and municipal supplies.

Land

There are more fracking wells than hiking trails in Colorado. Oil & gas operations are taking place on public lands and open spaces held in trust for the use and enjoyment of all Coloradans — yet oil & gas companies are extracting these resources for private profit at the public’s expense.

Mineral rights owners can be forced to lease their mineral estate to an oil & gas company even if they do not wish to do so, under a legal process known as forced pooling.

Lands Under Threat

Climate

Methane emissions from oil & gas operations are 60% higher than previously thought. A warming climate leads to increased drought and water shortages, longer and more intense wildfire seasons, reduced snowpack, and record-breaking heat waves.

Jobs and Economy

The Not So Good

In 2022, the oil & gas industry accounted for over $1 billion in state and local tax revenue in Colorado annually. Although this may seem like a hefty sum, recreation and tourism account for $66 billion per year in Colorado by comparison. Learn more: our webinar with CFI compares the outdoor economy with the oil & gas industry’s contribution.

In 2023, the oil & gas industry accounted for roughly 1% of Colorado’s workforce, or about 30,000 direct jobs. By comparison, the outdoor recreation and tourism industry accounted for over 321,000 direct jobs in 2023, and clean energy accounted for about 64,000 Colorado jobs in 2022.

The Bad

The oil & gas industry receives bailouts, subsidies, tax breaks, and exemptions, yet at least 12 companies in Colorado have filed for bankruptcy since 2015.

Oil & gas companies in Colorado frequently fail to complete tax documents — or file incomplete ones — thereby underpaying their required taxes by billions of dollars, despite Colorado having one of the lowest oil & gas tax rates in the country.

Oil & gas is a boom-and-bust industry that creates unstable employment, relying on frequent layoffs and transient workers relocated from state to state. Production and jobs depend on international prices and the laws of supply and demand: when prices are low, companies slow production and lay off workers; when wells run dry in one state, workers are laid off or moved to another.

The Ugly

Orphaned and abandoned wells in Colorado could cost taxpayers billions of dollars. Nearby oil & gas production can drive down home values, trapping residents in unsafe living conditions they cannot afford to leave.

Job creation claims are often overstated, inflated by indirect jobs such as gas station attendants and hospitality workers.

Fires, Explosions, & Spills

In 2017, there were over a dozen Oil & Gas related fires and explosions in Colorado alone.

The most well-known tragedy is the home explosion in Firestone that killed two men, severely injured a mother, and forced a small child to jump from a window to escape with his life.

Although oil & gas operations can take place as close as 2000 ft (or closer) to homes in Colorado, emergency responders have stated that the evacuation radius for oil & gas leaks and explosions is typically anywhere from 2500 ft to over a mile.

Here are some of the most severe incidents that received attention in the local news media over the last years: